At the north end of the room is a window which was unlocked. It slid upwards.

Marks on the paint in the window indicated that it had been recently opened. The screen was kept in place with two hook locks. The east lock was in place but the west lock was slightly opened.

Outside the window on the first floor was a driveway on the north side of the building.

A pipe that ran along the building appeared to have been recently pulled away from the brick. It was secured to the brick with a clamp. The clamp was high enough to offer a foothold for anyone crawling through the window.

The window area was fingerprinted.

The following day, Dr. George Ogura performed an autopsy. He took pictures of Beard’s left breast that showed a vertical cut.

The left side of her hyoid bone in her neck was fractured and she had extensive hemorrhages into the right side of her neck muscles.

It was apparent that her killer had strangled her.

Police took a vaginal swab of the victim.

The murder investigation stalled, however.

More than 30 years passed before Det. Martin Smith of the Denver Police Cold case unit found the post-mortem kit that was taken from Beard’s remains. That happened on Aug. 18, 2011.

Forensic scientist Susan Berdine performed a test that confirmed that the material taken from Beard’s body was sperm. A DNA test was done. Beard had been raped.

But when Smith searched for the victim’s clothing and crime scene photographs he discovered that they had all been tossed on March 13, 1994.

Nearly two years after Smith had discovered the post-mortem kit, he received the results of the DNA testing.

Kirk Mitchell is a general assignment reporter at The Denver Post who focuses on criminal justice stories. He began working at the newspaper in 1998, after writing for newspapers in Mesa, Ariz., and Twin Falls, Idaho, and The Associated Press in Salt Lake City. Mitchell first started writing the Cold Case blog in Fall 2007, in part because Colorado has more than 1,400 unsolved homicides.